Business Information - Top 10 Sites

It was a full house at UKeiG's workshop on Business Information on the Internet last week. Sixteen people from commercial organisations, legal firms, government bodies, public libraries, university libraries and independent consultancies tried out some of the key resources on the web. At the end of the workshop they compiled a top 10 sources and sites. This is it:

1. Yahoo Finance - excellent source of information on stock markets and share prices for the major markets around the world. For many of them there is 5-6 years of historical share price data available as graphs and in tabular form. The link given here goes to the UK and Ireland version, but there are links at the bottom of the page to other versions of Yahoo Finance around the world.
   
2. Big Charts - data and charts covering the US and some other major markets around the world. To view the list of countries, click on the Global link in the top left hand area of the screen, close to the keyword search box. There is a useful range of charting options. Historical prices are available as charts (use the Java Chart option) and as individual data items for specific dates.
   
3. US Census Bureau - quick access to macroeconomic data
   
4. Bureau van Dijk - collection of company databases covering a wide range of countries. Priced service but free trials available. The Free Directory is a good way of identifying the location of a company and its subsidiaries, and for drawing up lists of companies by sector, size and country.
   
5. Trade Association Forum - the TAF directory enables you to search for trade associations, guilds or federations by industry name or organisation name.
6. UK Trade Invest - government organisation supporting both UK companies trading internationally and overseas enterprises seeking to locate in the UK. Market information can be browsed by sector and country
7. Alacrawiki Spotlights -a guide to business information companies, publishers and databases. The Alacra Industry Spotlights in particular are extremely useful in providing reviews and commentary on industry specific web sites that have statistics, market research and news.
8. OFFSTATS: Official Statistics on the Web - one of the best starting point for statistical sources by country, topic or subject. In the country lists, these are mainly sites provided by statistical offices, central banks and government departments and agencies. The topics list is comprised of links to the statistics pages of international organizations and associations, and a few commercial sites.
9. Newsgator - web based RSS reader and aggregator. Ideal if you are new to RSS feeds and want to get a "feel" for how RSS works. Main advantage over Bloglines is that Newsgator supports user authentication, which is essential if you want to subscribe to feeds offered by priced services such as Factiva.
   
10. Business Sources on the Internet - well, the participants had to include this one as it was the source for many of the notes for the day! Maintained by me (Karen Blakeman), it lists business resources by type (e.g. Financials, statistics, news). As they were sort of brainwashed throughout the day into using it, I am going to add an eleventh site to this list.
    
    newsBriefsOman - news and comment about Oman. Maintained by Sue Hutton, this is a very nice site providing news and information on Oman, royal decrees, Omani officials. Down the right hand side of the screen is an extensive list of links to key resources that are invaluable to anyone wanting to do business in the area. What is not immediately obvious is that the site uses blogging technology. As well as having good quality content, this is an excellent example of how one can use a blog to develop a site.